Half Moon Bay downs Notre Dame-Belmont to repeat as CCS girls’ basketball champion

Ordinarily, CCS championship games are played at neutral sites. So, such a display wasn’t allowed when Half Moon Bay won its two previous titles in in 2017 and ’20. But the 2020-21 season has been no ordinary season — moved to the spring and shortened to 15 games due to the coronavirus pandemic — ending in triumph for the Cougars, but at the same time, bittersweet.

“The one disappointing thing I have is, this is our [15th] game,” Half Moon Bay head coach Antonio Veloso said. “So, we’d actually be rolling into league right now. So, imagine if we were playing like this and rolling into that league. That would have been nice.”

No. 1-seed Half Moon Bay (11-4) was certainly at the top of its game, rallying to a 58-49 victory over No. 2 Notre Dame-Belmont (9-6).

On the heels of Abby Kennedy’s standout performance in last Thursday’s semifinal win — the junior guard scored 34 points against Harker — the Cougars rode a different heroine Saturday night as sophomore Alli Dioli seized the spotlight, recording a double-double with 21 points and 11 rebounds.

“I love playing in these kinds of games because it’s just fun,” Dioli said. “It’s just high energy. We all get hyped for each other. It’s just really fun.”

Beyond the numbers, Dioli took charge of the court as HMB contended with Notre Dame-Belmont’s power tandem of senior Alaiyah San Juan and Alex Salise.

It was a tall order as HMB center Genevieve Belmonte saw limited minutes due to early foul trouble. Salise matched Dioli for the game-high of 21 points. And after HMB opened the game on a 7-0 run, Salise was a menace on defense with two early steals while looking to turn the game into a run-and-gun, transition game, the kind the Tigers are best at.

But Dioli settled the floor in a hurry, putting the Cougars in motion with their smooth, tactical half-court sets, doing so by asserting a strong passing tempo with crisp, clean ball movement.

“Once we got in that rhythm, that ball was floating around really nicely,” Veloso said. “When we can move that ball and run the way we do, I think we wear them down.”

The Cougars keyed on San Juan and effectively so, holding the dynamic senior guard to just two points on the night.

“We had to,” Veloso said. “She and [Salise], they were probably the two best players on this court. But we were just the better team.”

In the wake of Kennedy’s big semifinal performance, NDB limited the shooting guard’s chances as well. Kennedy drilled an early 3-pointer to up the Cougars’ lead to 10-3 but she would settle for 11 points on the night.

But NDB simply couldn’t make shots, especially in the early going. The Tigers shot at a 30.5% clip throughout and converted a mere 3 of 15 shots in the first quarter and were only slightly better at 5 of 17 in the second.

“A big part of what we do is transition,” Notre Dame-Belmont head coach Sam Rossi said “We kind of live and die by that. I let my team run and gun, and it’s a lot of teaching of when to shoot and when not to. So, I think a lot of those early layups were kind of in transition. … [Salise and San Juan] had those shots, and I trust them all the time. So, that’s not a bad shot for me if they’re driving to the bucket.”

NDB center Mia Adao created driving lanes in the second quarter and looked to turn the tide. The senior went for a double-double with 15 points and 12 rebounds. And when she took a no-look pass from Salise and drove through for her third layup of the quarter, it cut the deficit to 25-20 with just over four minutes to go in the half.

But Dioli responded with a quick perimeter 3 — one of her four 3-pointers on the night — and the Cougars went on to finish the half on a 9-2 run.

Then in the second half, Half Moon Bay unveiled another weapon when forward Abby Co caught fire. The sophomore totaled 14 points on the night, nine of them coming in the third quarter.

“I think the beautiful part about our team is we’ve got a lot of kids that can play,” Veloso said. “And I think what helped us throughout the year, especially the last three games, is we started figuring out how to distribute that ball and making sure the right kids shot the ball at the right time.”

NDB started the second half on an 8-2 run. And when sophomore Monique Samson drilled a 10-foot jumper, it drew the Tigers to within two scores at 34-30. It would be as close as NDB would get though, much in part to Co answering with a deep perimeter heave that looked well off the mark, but the left-handed shooter’s look glanced off the backboard and angled through the cylinder to spark a 10-2 run for the Cougars.

“Abby (Co) was just doing great,” Dioli said. “I mean, the floor was just wide open for her to drive. They were spread out, so that’s what Abby’s good at doing. And that step-back 3, she can hit those, so I’m not surprised.”

HMB shot 7 of 12 in the third quarter and was 40% from the field in the game.

Rossi said NDB did what it set out to do in limiting HMB to 58 points after the Cougars won their previous two CCS games 70-24 over Mercy-Burlingame in the quarterfinals and 82-55 over Harker in the semis.

“They left it all out on the court,” Rossi said. “And that was our goal coming into the game. We knew they averaged 75, 80 points a game. So, we knew we were going to have to work really hard defensively. We kept them down, we just didn’t score enough.”

It was an emotional scene for the Tigers following the game. The team’s five seniors have already graduated, including Salise, who transferred to NDB from South City prior to her junior year. Salise said when she arrived at NDB she wasn’t exactly friends with many of her new teammates, as she had earned some ire after years of aggressive old-school play against some of them on the AAU circuit.

“I definitely met good people on this team that made me feel comfortable coming here,” Salise said. “I was very nervous coming onto this team. But I felt like I fit in very easily once I got here.”

Salise and San Juan are actually slated to play together in college. Both are committed to the NCAA Division II program at Dominican University.

“This was one of the best teams I’ve ever been on,” Salise said. “We pushed each other to be the best no matter what. Even on and off the court, we were there pushing each other.”

HMB is set to return four players from its starting five next season. And, for Dioli, the best may be yet to come, according to Veloso.

“You’re going to see one of the better players to ever come through here, I think is right there,” Veloso said. “She handles the ball better. I think defensively, when she gets there, that’s a good college player right there.”